1. Field of the Invention
This patent application relates to a clean, real smoke fire simulator used to train firefighting personnel in a realistic scenario. More specifically this patent application relates to a fire simulator which uses smoke generated from combusting flammable material, and not synthetic, artificial smoke. Further, this patent application provides a fire simulator which uses smoke generated from combusting flammable material followed by air treatment to clean the smoke before the cleaned smoke is released into the environment thereby reducing pollutant gas emissions to the environment. More specifically, this air treatment uses a thermal oxidizer to eliminate visible smoke emissions and reduce environmental impact of the released air.
2. Background
When training firefighting personnel, it is important to provide training scenarios that are as realistic to an actual fire emergency as possible. Thus, an effective scenario will have flames, smoke, heat, sounds, and obstacles. Current training regimes use a variety of simulation techniques. The most realistic is to create an actual fire situation. However, although in an arguably controlled environment, due to the unpredictable nature of fire, this approach creates a high possibility of danger to firefighters without complete operative control over the situation. Also, this is likely cost prohibitive as the structure is destroyed and will need to be rebuilt to train additional personnel. Further, this burning produces large amounts of smoke and particulates which are directly released into the environment.
A second training approach creates a fire situation having an active flame with the simulator filled with artificial smoke. This allows greater control over the training environment reducing possibilities of injury during training. However, the artificial smoke is generated from chemicals that produce smoke that is non toxic but does not behave in the same way as smoke generated from carbonaceous materials usually encountered in real fire situations, thus making the training session of limited value. U.S. Pat. No. 4,526,548 discloses a trailer having multiple rooms for fire training purposes where each room can be supplied with artificial smoke. Besides the drawback of using artificial smoke, the system used in the '548 patent ventilates the smoke directly into the atmosphere without cleaning or reducing the amount of particulates before release. Direct ventilation of smoke containing toxic particles to the atmosphere increases air pollution and negatively impacts the environment
A third approach to training firefighters is to create a fire using a controllable gas-fired burner, usually using propane gas, while supplying a more realistic smoke than artificial smoke. An example of a system utilizing this approach is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,320,536 assigned to Symtron Systems, Inc. The '536 patent discloses a smoke generation means utilizing a hydraulic fluid. The fluid is designed to be non-toxic and to behave more realistically than artificial smoke. Nevertheless, the smoke generated by this fluid does not have the same properties as smoke found at an actual fire emergency. The artificial smoke generated by hydraulic fluid behaves differently and thus limits the educational applicability in this trainer system. Moreover, the system taught by this patent negatively impacts the environment by emitting toxic smoke to the atmosphere. U.S. Pat. No. 7,008,230 assigned to Superior Simulation Technologies uses oil dripped onto a hot plate to generate thick smoke which is delivered to the simulator using fans. Although this system generates more realistic smoke than the other described systems, the device described in the '230 patent negatively impacts the environment by releasing untreated toxic smoke directly to the atmosphere. Indeed, a portion of the training using the simulator of the '230 patent involves trainers evacuating smoke from the simulator into the atmosphere. Further, neither the '536 nor '230 system recirculates smoke within the trainer apparatus requiring a greater amount of fuel to be used while also creating a greater amount of smoke that pollutes the environment.
Thus, it can be seen that a fire training simulator is needed which provides a live flame for trainee training while also generating real smoke. Additionally, to reduce the environmental impact of the training, a smoke recirculation means is required to minimize fuel use and smoke generation while a clean-up system is needed to clean the smoke before the gases are ultimately released into the atmosphere thereby reducing pollutant gas emissions typically expelled during the training of firefighting personnel.